Wednesday, May 20, 2009

May 18th Booneville to Berea, KY 60 miles




We had a fairly long day of riding with a long stretch with nowhere to stop, so we got to stop on the side of the shoulderless road and make PB&J bagels for lunch. The one really cool thing that happened (just when we needed it the most) was when a UPS guy stopped and handed us both bottles of cold water (since we had not had a chance to fill our bottles in over 45 miles it was a welcome reprieve).
We made it into Berea, which was actually a really cute little college town, with what appeared to be normal people. While we were stopped in front of a hotel trying to figure out where we were going to stay, a local guy, Jack, stopped to talk to us. He had done the TransAmerica trail the previous year leaving from Berea and going to Washington. He told us about a different route he took through Missouri, that is north off the TransAm trail & takes you for over 200 miles on a rail trail. It sounded really interesting so we decided to look it up. Given that we are both pretty fed up with Kentucky and not feeling like it is enhancing our experience being here, we opted to change up our route. We took a detour north, cutting off the remaining portion of Kentucky and starting in St. Charles, Missouri and taking the Katy Trail (look it up if you're interested- very cool) through Missouri, then traveling southwest through Kansas where we will re-meet our route on the Transamerica trail. We leave in the morning and are really excited & looking forward to the change. The trail has nice places to stop and stay all along it & wineries! Will update again when we can!

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